Google Voice and you: what it is and how you can use it

Have you been hearing all the chatter about Google Voice but still haven't …

With so much news lately about Google Voice, those who haven't kept up on every tiny development have found themselves lost. What exactly is Google Voice? Is it a phone redirecting service? VoIP? Voicemail? All of the above? None of the above? Even some of our staff members are confused about what Google Voice offers and why people would want to use it, so we thought it would be helpful to offer a guide to Google Voice for those just tuning in.

Google Voice originated as GrandCentral, an independent company that hit the scene in 2005. GrandCentral allowed users to register a new phone number and direct it to ring multiple phones; it could also collect messages and act as your personal switchboard operator. This sounds boring on the surface, but it provided a number of cool features, such as the ability to listen in on voicemail messages as they were being left or to tell a specific number that your phone number is no longer connected (great for stalkers and crazed PR people, who are kind of like stalkers). Google acquired GrandCentral in 2007, and promptly sat on the project for nearly two years before it relaunched the service as Google Voice in March of 2009.

Google didn't just take GrandCentral and slap a colorful logo on it, though. The search giant made a number of improvements on the already nifty service, and it has become a must-have for the handful of early adopters who were lucky enough to get in either as a grandfathered GrandCentral user or through an invite. Let's look at what you can get out of the (currently) free service.

Calls

Users can register phone numbers in practically any area code they want, choosing local or faraway destinations. Under Google, the service now allows you to choose words or witty phrases that your phone number spells out (not present under GrandCentral), so have fun and good luck trying to grab (312) 55-BALLS. You cannot port an existing number of yours to Google Voice, however, which may be viewed as a downside to those who are married to a longtime cell number or the like. (Update: Some readers have written in to say that it is possible to port a number.)

After that, the most basic service that Google Voice offers is call forwarding. Forward calls to as many or as few numbers as you like, and you can even forward them to different phones based on who's calling. This is helpful if you're like me and don't want check-ins from the boss going to your cell phone, but you do want calls from dear ol' mom and dad. You can also set certain groups (or individuals) to be sent directly to Voicemail, to the Spam folder, or block the call altogether.

Another useful feature is the ability to screen callers—you can either have the calls sent directly to your phone with no filtering, or you can have Google ask them to say their name first. The service will ring you, tell you who's calling, and give you the option to take the call or send them to voicemail. This is nice for numbers that you don't recognize, as you wouldn't know who they're from otherwise. You can also change this behavior depending on a group (Friends, Family, Work, etc.) or an individual basis. So it's possible to always screen unknown numbers, for example, and always forward your friends directly. This is where the service gives you the ability to listen in on voicemails as they are being left, too.

Receiving calls is just the beginning. Through Google Voice, you can also make free calls to any US number. These will appear to originate from your Google number even when you're calling from your cell or your home line—the receiver's caller ID will show your Google number (therefore not giving away your other numbers).

You can also record phone calls that you've received, although this functionality does not work with outgoing calls you make. But if someone dials in, it's possible to record interviews, catch important details for transcription later, or come up with some other nefarious plan for your Google Voice recordings. It's very helpful, although it would be more helpful if these recordings were transcribed like voicemails are (read on).

Voicemail

By far the coolest feature of Google Voice's voicemail is that the service automatically transcribes the voice messages left by callers and then sends the transcription to you through a variety of mediums. For example, I receive my voicemails via text message and e-mail when they come in. Not only is this faster than listening to the message a few times to get all the details, but it also gives me a written record that is easily stored for future reference. Keep in mind, however, that the transcription is not always 100 percent accurate—from experience, I find that it's about 80 percent, though you can usually fill in the blanks by looking at the context.

In any case, you can always listen to the voice recordings online. Additionally, you can download an audio file of the recordings for your records, or grab some embed code for putting embarrassing postings on the Internet (nota bene: people will usually be unhappy if you do this without their permission). Or, if your voicemail is better suited for someone else—another family member, a coworker, etc.—you can forward the message onto that person.

SMS and miscellaneous features

When people SMS your Google Voice number, the message will go directly to one or more (however many you have set up) mobile phones. You can respond to those SMSs directly from the phone, and that response will appear to come from your Google Voice number. The cool part, though, is that you can also send and receive SMSs right from the Google Voice Web interface, meaning that you don't have to whip out your phone every time you want to text your friend to ask why he's late picking you up—assuming you're in front of a computer already, that is. Google Voice lets you archive your SMS logs too so that you can reach them anytime from the website.

For those worried about wasting mobile phone minutes, Google Voice lets you transfer your calls to another phone, right in the middle of the call. When you're on a phone call and press the * button, your other phones listed on the account will ring. When you pick up the phone you want to use (say, your home landline), you can hang up on the original phone and your call will still be in progress.

There are a handful of other features that Google Voice offers, but those are most of the big ones. Those of us at Ars who have been using Google Voice since the GrandCentral days are really pleased with the changes Google has made thus far, and we have begun using it for everyday things like our work-related calls and routing calls between phones.

Whether all of these services will remain free forever is still up for debate. But, given Google's usual patterns, it's unlikely that the company will begin charging regular users for the service. Based on their other services, Google probably has some plan up its sleeve to offer a version of Google Voice for businesses that it will charge for (similar to its already-existing Google Apps package). If you can get access to Google Voice, give it a try, if only for the call filtering and voicemail transcribing features.

Jacqui Cheng
Jacqui is an Editor at Large at Ars Technica, where she has spent the last eight years writing about Apple culture, gadgets, social networking, privacy, and more. Emailjacqui@arstechnica.com//Twitter@eJacqui

I'm still waiting on my new phone number. My dumb ass picked an area code that was still long distance to my area. Fortunately, GV has an option to pay $10 for a new number. I ordered it about a week ago but haven't heard back.

Knowing Google they will be transcribing ALL your messages for data mining (the same way they do with email) and linking it with your account information and finding out what you like to talk about when it's too private to send via email.

That's their revenue stream. Better ads based on personal info you wouldn't type.

I can't tell you how nice it is (ok maybe i can) to have the ability to post my GV number online and be able to select when i actually get the calls, when they go to voicemail, and to be notified of those voicemails through email.

No google voice story would be complete without mentioning Gizmo5. Gizmo5 is a SIP service, they offer real VoIP, a real number and allow you to buy minutes etc.

They also happen to integrate with Google Voice, if you set it up in their website, all calls made with your Gizmo5 account will appear to come from Google Voice, and if you setup google voice to forward to your Gizmo5 account....yea. They also are giving GV users 30 minute calls in and out free for the moment.

There just so happens to be a full SIP client in the iPhone App Store too, but i think it only works on Wi-Fi unless you jailbreak.

Does GV integrate with GMail and Contacts?My biggest gripe about switching phones (sometimes my Blackberry is just too big) is that I don't have all the numbers on my secondary phone. It would be great if they were all stored on GV and integrated with GMail. Of course they would need to be accessible from any ordinary (ie non-smart-) phone, because, if I have a smartphone, most probably syncing of all my contacts isn't such an issue.

actually this article is a bit off. You can use google voice to send out SMS on a phone if you have a data plan, which probably has AT&T all worked up, because it easily bypasses a revenue stream. You can access google voice by going to voice.google.com And you can call international numbers for really cheap using that same web site on your phone. Also, you can even call out from a regular phone by simply calling your google voice number and then pressing 2 to call out.

Thank goodness for the non-approval process of visiting websites for the iPhone

At the moment Google Voice will not allow you to forward calls to Canadian area codes (which is a shame since GrandCentral allowed it), but as of the other day calls *to* Canada are now free. My parents recently moved there and I have been using it to call them without issue.

Google Voice has turned out to be as huge as getting TiVo was many years ago.

I love the voice transcription. So far it has been 100 percent. Nice having the phone not ring and just a notification that a new voicemail has arrived and just read it like any other email.

The Gmail like interface is really clean and easy to use.

I didn't think I would use the SMS support but it has been the most common way of contacting people. One thing that is a little strange is there is a definite mismatch between people texting you and you replying back in a very email type interface. SMS conversations end up being a ping pong back and forth between 'text speak' type messages from people on cellphones typing 'wat r u up to?' messages and then lengthy multi-sentence prose responses.

I was a bit surprised when I gave Ubuntu another try a few days ago and first loaded up Chrome and then brought up Gmail, Google Voice, and my Google Docs stuff I've been collaborating with others online with and was good to go as if I hadn't changed OSes. And now that my Google Number has gotten to most of my contacts/friends finally making changes to my current landline, Vongage, and cellphone setup is going to be trivial and seamless.

So far I really enjoy using it, unfortunately the idea of switching to a new phone number is just not happening for me. I have however managed to setup my G1 to use only the voicemail with google voice. That means all my regular numbers calls come to my phone and I dont have the handy tracking and other options that comes with calls and sms but instead I basically just switched the number my phone uses for voicemail so that all voicemail goes to google voice. In other words I get visual voicemail that I think is much better then tmobiles version.

If they ever allow the option to port your regular number I will be hooked!

We've been using GotVMail (now apparently Grasshopper) for several years which has many of the same features. They were able to take our existing phone number and change it into a voice tree that can ring any number we want. If someone goes to voice mail the message is emailed as an attachment. We've been using Skype in conjunction as well.

Google Voice sounds like a worthy competitor, rolling in some of the features of Skype, and adding some nifty features on top. Transferring my number would be essential to really transitioning to it though. It is such a pain to have to publish a new phone number.

Originally posted by bartfat:actually this article is a bit off. You can use google voice to send out SMS on a phone if you have a data plan, which probably has AT&T all worked up, because it easily bypasses a revenue stream. You can access google voice by going to voice.google.com

I'm not sure why you say that makes this article "off," but yes, you can use a mobile version of Google Voice pretty easily from many phones.

I hope they come to the old world at some point ... wonder how they would handle the differen countries though ... say I have a dutch and a german phone, but someone would call my gv number, (which would have to have a specific country code I guess), would he be billed for an international call or could they manage to bill him only locally? Or they could just create some kind of european country code ^^

I use Gizmo5's GizmoVoice (www.gizmovoice.com) and my Gigaset IP DECT phone and I have a Google Voice phone. I can make and receive calls on the Gigaset IP DECT phone using my Google Voice number. Acts like a regular phone. Person on the other side sees my Google Voice number on Caller ID. search for "gigaset" on Amazon.com.

This article really wasn't very helpful. Sure, it runs down the features list, but at the crucial part of it where you explain how this all actually works, everything is poorly worded and not clear enough. I ended up just looking it up myself. The paragraph under the "Calls" heading should have started out with something simple and easy-to-digest, like "Basically, you set up a new phone number through the service and configure how it redirects your calls."

So the question is presumably how much will people put up with to get the iPhone? So far, they have had to put up with ATT. Now they are having to give up GV as well.

Is it really clear that you get a better return on the phone by forcing people to buy stuff they do not want to get it, whether its a network subscription or calling services, as opposed to just raising the prices on the phone itself?

It seems such a perverse way of going about realizing the value. One has the same question about the OS. Yes, you can make people buy hardware they would not otherwise choose so as to get it, and yes, that hardware has margins which you wouldn't otherwise get because you'd sell less of it. But when you add up all the costs involved, is this really the best way to maximize ROI on the asset? In the same way, yes, if you did not grant exclusives, you'd not get the returns from the exclusive network provider. But you could charge more for the phone, and it would be more desirable because you'd not be crippling it by stopping it running services people want from their smart phone, so you'd sell more at higher direct prices. Less of course the contributions from the network operator.

Presumably they have gone into all this very carefully and the answer is that it makes sense. Or maybe its just the way they see the world, and they cannot see it objectively?

:The paragraph under the "Calls" heading should have started out with something simple and easy-to-digest, like "Basically, you set up a new phone number through the service and configure how it redirects your calls.":

Dude, the guy even provided screen shots. If you can't wade through this article, perhaps it's time to take some English classes to improve your reading comprehension. I got a lot more useful information out of what he said than your rewriting of it.

I've had GV since it was GrandCentral. The year-plus wait for Google to fix certain little CrandCentral-isms (mainly the inability to pick up a call without pressing "1" on keypad) ... or even say anything about what they were doing! Was far too long but now that we've gotten through it, I am glad I persevered and kept this as the main number I give out.

VM transcriptions are like a gift from the gods to me - I'm hard of hearing. The ability to have a single, main phone number which costs nothing to maintain and can be redirected to any other number is a killer feature; this means I can switch landline/wireless phone plans at the drop of a hat and never miss a call.

Right now all I'm really waiting for is a WinMo GV app which doesn't depend on web. I'm also thinking that Google would be a perfect buyer for Skype, if the legal oddities can be worked out.

Thanks for the article. I had missed the ability to have all calls from a certain number go directly to VM, and since I have one annoying telemarketer/stalker, this was a nice find.

Google Voice also works backwards, as it were... I've replaced all my various voicemail accounts with Google Voice by setting forward on no-answer to my GV number. No matter which number someone calls, it gets sent to the same number, and all my voicemails are in the same place with the same rules.

Apple has been taking a lot of heat for blocking this from the app store. To me, that stinks of AT&T. AT&T doesn't want Google Voice destroying their SMS revenue by giving the same functionality for free.